19 month old and nonpunitive respectful approach

[gribbit]

I am looking for some ideas on how to handle some issues with my 19 month old. We are a family that deeply believes in no punishment or so called consequences. We also believe that our child is a member of our family and that her needs and wants should be treated with respect. I have no problem letting dd explore as long as I can help keep her safe. However, I am having a hard time with some of the things she wants to do lately and I was hoping that some of the mamas here that have a similar philosophy could share some wisdom with me. One example is that she really likes to look in, and pull things out of the fridge. I have no problem letting her look for a little while, but I can't let her stand there for long periods of time since that would cause food to spoil. I try to redirect and explain why we need to close the door, and ask if she wants to help close it but she is not easy to redirect. Eventually I have to close the door and she gets really upset. Also, our house is very baby proofed and we put objects that are not safe for her to have out of reach. However, she is very verbal so she just asks for things she wants even if she can't see them. For her out of sight is not out of mind. Some stuff we can explore together, but I am not going to let her play with really unsafe things that can seriuosly harm her. I guess I feel really conflicted because I want to be respectful of her wishes, but it seems like I find myself having to redirect her a lot and she is often upset. I just feel like I have this ideal that I am not really meeting. Is there anything I am missing? I would love to hear how others deal with similar issues and still maintain a respectful nonpunitive approach..

michelle

[DevaMajka]

We had the same fridge issue! I tried a lot of things, and honestly, the approach that has worked the best, is to just leave him alone when he's in the fridge. He leaves, of his own volition, faster than he did when I tried to "get" him to leave. I do have to remind him to shut the door when he's done, though. I've told him enough times that we don't want the door open too long, because we want to keep the cold air in, but, really, how easy is that for a 17 mo to understand? And I think he understands a LOT of what we say. He does understand that we want the door closed, I believe, but the "why" is pretty complex, imo.
Anyways, I decided to try the "non-coercive" approach to the fridge situation, and he does indeed decide on his own that he's done playing in the fridge. I'm sure that its easier for him to leave sooner when I'm not constantly distracting him from his important work rearranging the fridge :)
I just decided that I'd see it as, he obviously has some reason for wanting to look in the fridge. Let him do it, and when he's done, he'll follow suit, and close the fridge like we do (though, like I said, I do need to remind him to actually shut the door once he leaves, and he's happy to do so).
Dp isn't quite sold on that idea, and I've noticed (casually observing) that ds spends longer in the fridge when dp tries to get him to shut the door. (dp explains, and redirects, and all that, respectfully).

As far as handling unsafe items, I tell ds that something is "unsafe" (dangerous doesn't seem quite honest to me for some things, kwim?). And I'll tell him why, and I try to find a reasonable substitute. But...if that doesn't work, I'm ok with him being unhappy about it. I mean, if there's a way to let him touch it supervised, that's great. But, I really am not comfortable with him playing with a knife. So... imo, thats not disrespectful. Well, as long as I try to be empathetic that his desire to play with it is an OK desire. kwim? "I can see you want to play with that knife. It looks like fun to you. But it's unsafe, and not to play with. Perhaps we can find something else that would be fun to play with."
I dunno- maybe some people would disagree with that? But really, if its an honest to goodness UNSAFE thing to play with, I'm ok with saying no (I don't really say the word "no"), and letting him cry if that's what he feels like doing to respond to that.

Oh, another thing- I give him information all the time, about everything, whether I expect him to respond or not. Meaning, for example, if he's playing with something that's loud, while dp is sleeping (he has way different hours than we do!) I tell him that its loud, and daddy's trying to sleep. If he continues playing with it, that's fine. Just giving info. Well, recently, there have been a couple times that I've said that, and he did stop playing with the loud toy right away, and looked for something else to do. I was actually pretty surprised!
I guess I'm just saying that because it happened recently. lol. And at first, I thought that by "telling him to do something" and then not enforcing it, I'd just send the message that he didn't have to do anything that I said, and that he'd NOT do anything I said. But that thought didn't really mesh with my parenting philosophy, AND it doesn't mesh with reality, imo. I've found that just the opposite is true. He's quite happy most of the time to go along with what I'm asking. and if he doesn't, he has a good reason, kwim?

[Attached Mama]

Sounds like you are fine. I think that as much respect as we show our children, we still have to realize that they are immature. I don't say that in a bad or demeaning way, but as scientific fact. Their brains are not able to understand or process certain information and it is then our job to protect them in those areas. So if that means telling them they cannot play with something that is going to cost us too much money (like maybe leaving the fridge open too long) or that could in some possible way harm them (like the example with the knives) then that is love to gently forbid them. Like it or not, we live in a community/society and IMO there are always going to be some guidelines that all need to follow for the safety of others such as traffic laws etc. So I don't think that being respectful means that we can never tell our kids "no" about something. And I think that it is important that, along with learning to explore their world, they also learn that certain things are not allowed. But that's just my opinion...

[Smithie]

I agree that "no" is not a punishment when there is a real reason, not just a convenience reason, behind the "no." Our "nos" for our 19 m.o. involve the fridge, the dishwasher, calling Guam on my cell phone, hurting the pets, going out the front door, etc. You could also say that playing with the buttons on the TV is a "no," since we turn off the TV when he tries it in order to prevent it from breaking prematurely. We enforce our "nos" by physically removing the baby/pet/phone if distraction doesn't work. We always, always explain why the rule exists, even though he probably doesn't understand yet, even though we've explained it five million times already that day.

It sounds like your kid is more stubborn than my kid, though :mischief Mine will whine for 2 seconds and then pursue another interest, so I don't worry that he is being traumatized. But other than paring the "nos" down to the absolute minimum and ALWAYS explaining the safety/responsibility reason for the rule, I think you pretty much have to ride out this stage and wait for some more development on the communication front. I ask myself every day if there is a way to work around any of our "no" issues, and I've come up with many just by keeping the issue in mind.